50 Reasons Not to Change/The Tribes We Lead

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After viewing the above presentations, reflect on the following questions in a well-written post on your Reflection Blog.

• How do you react when you hear colleagues using some of the excuses listed in the 50 Reasons Not to Change graphic?
• Do you ever use any of these excuses yourself?
• How can you overcome the thinking that creates those responses to change efforts?
• Do you agree with Seth Godin’s concept that change is driven by tribes?
• What can you take away from this exercise to immediately use in your career?

At some level, everyone has a natural resistant to change. Fears of the unknow has the ability to test even the most steadfast individuals. Typically, we find (or create) excuses to resist such change, especially when we have little reason to alter the status quo. In fact, Dr. Daryl Watkins (n.d) provides such examples in his 50 Reasons not to Change presentation; excuses like:

·       The boss will never buy it.

·       It needs further investigations.

·       Our competitors are not doing it.

·       It’s too much trouble to change.

·       Our company is different.

In an environment where the status quo provides stability or even predictability, affecting change and challenging the status que provides a major challenge for leaders and managers. According to Mark Murphy (2014):

Ironically, getting employees to accept change is easier when the situation is dire (like in a turnaround situation where change feels urgent and necessary). But when employees get comfortable because everything in the organization is good, they get complacent with the status quo. That’s when you hear protests to change that sound like this: “But we’re already doing great, there’s no need to change.”

There have been many occasions during my time as a leader in military service when others have voiced their resistance to change and may have even used some of Dr. Watkins’ excused verbatim. Already knowing that resistance was inevitable, I would attempt to identify and understand the root cause of the resistance. For example, is someone (or others) resistance for the sake of being resistant? Are those resistant seeing something that I do not see? What level are the problem-solving skills of the resistant? Who stands to benefit if no change is made (path of least resistance) and for how long (short term/long term)? Thus, anticipating resistance and underlying causes, I would be able to better prepare my angle and argument for leading such changes.

I believe it is important for leaders to continuously seek opportunities to improve an organization through active leadership and to leverage driving forces to effectively convey new concepts and ideas. According to Brown (2011), “driving forces, put pressure on the organization to change” (p. 129). Thus, leaders must be in-tune with many factors that exist in a dynamic environment and be agile enough to exploit emergent behaviors. With this in mind, this is why it is important for me to prevent the nature urge to allow negative thoughts or excuses to occupy my thought process. As many leaders in the military learn, it’s important to expect the best, but plan for the worst. Through the planning processes, leaders must account for the most likely course of enemy action and the most dangerous course of enemy action.

Seth Godin (2009) provides a compelling argument that tribes have the ability and power to affect change through connecting others with ideas. In fact, Godin (2009) states, “And it turns out that its tribes, not money, not factories that can change our world. Than can change politics, that can align large number of people, not because you force them to do something against their will, but because they wanted to connect.” Thus, but making such (tribal) connections, a movement is created by identifying true believers and leading the movement. I believe that Godin’s argument that tribes drive change is accurate. History has shown that when large organized groups (tribes) directly challenge the status quo, significant change has resulted. Take for example notable event like the Boston Tea party, which eventually lead to the Revolutionary War or the Civil War. Although these are clearly extreme examples, smaller and still notable movement have altered significant changes in our world and in our societies.

I believe it is important for leaders/managers understand how resistance to change affects our organization’s ability to be agile and flexible in a dynamic environment. Thus, reflecting on this exercise, I also believe that trying to identify and understand the root causes of resistance is key. Doing so will better prepare a leader to convey their thoughts, ideas, and concepts. Furthermore, keeping Seth Godin’s (2009) lessons in mind about leading movements by connecting others (tribes), we as leaders have the ability to increase our effectiveness by leveraging these tribes.

References

Brown, D.(2011) Experiential Approach to Organization Development. Pearson Education. Kindle Edition.

Godin, S. (2009). The tribes we lead. Ted. Retrieved from http://www.ted.com/talks/seth_godin_on_the_tribes_we_lead#t-739764.

Murphy, M. (2014). The Status Quo Will Kill Change Management Efforts. Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/markmurphy/2014/12/18/the-status-quo-will-kill-change-management-efforts/#72b5772d520d.

Watkins, D. (n.d.). 50 Reasons Not to Change! Prezi Presentation. Retrieved from https://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/00/node/55009. 

How Companies Can Make Better Decisions

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After viewing the above video, reflect on the following questions in a well-written post on your Reflection Blog.

• Marcia Blenko argues that decision effectiveness correlates positively with employee engagement and organizational performance. How do you think that employee engagement relates to decision effectiveness?
• What are some impediments to good decision making?
• Blenko suggests that there are four elements of good decisions: quality, speed, yield, and effort. In your opinion, is there anything missing from this list?
• What can you take away from this exercise to immediately use in your career?

Decision making in today’s dynamic business environment is essential to an organization’s success and competitiveness. Companies that understand this concept design and structure their organizations to exploit the constant changing environment and the needs of their customers. Perhaps one of the most important aspects of making effective and timely decisions is the contribution and engagement of the company’s employees. While executives make important decisions that chart the course of their organization, the employee that work day-in and day-out within the environment and with customers have a valuable perspective on the terrain that has the potential for the decision makers to make more quality decisions. In fact, in an organization where decisions are timely and effective, this allows for better employee influence and activity. According to Marccia Blenko (2010), “Interestingly we also saw a high correlation between decision effectiveness and employee engagement. Which I guess shouldn’t be surprising that companies where it’s easier to make decisions and get things done are more simulating places for employees to work.” Indeed, making effective decisions not only improves employee engagement, but overall performance and profits. Marcia Blenco, Michael Mankins, and Paul Roger (2010) highlight the following findings from their research, “We found that decision effectiveness and financial results correlated at a 95% confidence level or higher for every country, industry, and company size in our sample.” I believe that when an organization has established a decision-making process that supports their industry and environment, this ensures better quality information flow and participation by all employees. Thus, they feel empowered and feel that they contribute to the organizations progress.

There are many impediment to effective decision making. In fact, Blenko (2010) notes that organizations today have become more complicated as a result of restructuring and trying new things, which has caused confusion about how decisions are made. These well-intended restructuring events have in essence, had the opposite effects. Blenko et al. (2010) have identified the four following elements that are associated with making good decisions:

1.     Decision Quality: whether decisions proved to be right more often than not.

2.     Speed: whether decisions were made faster or slower than competitors.

3.     Yield: how well decisions were translated into action.

4.     Effort: The time, trouble, and expense required for each key decision.

I believe that the above elements are vital to making effective decisions, I would also add some form of feedback system. Though we can concentrate on each of the four elements in-depth, it is important to evaluate or examine critical decision after the fact. In other words, reviewing the situation, context, decision(s) holistically in an after action review manner and used in an management program.

Making effective decision is not only an important aspect in business, but in everyday situations as well. When making important decisions, I believe that using the four elements could increase the quality of one’s critical thinking as it forces one to see the decision being made as more of a process than automatically addressing an issue. Being able to view decisions at an in-depth level (without over thinking) could prove to be beneficial for both an individual and an organization.

References

Blenko, M. (2010). How Companies Can Make Better Decisions, Faster. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbxpg6D4Hk8.

Blenko, M., Mankins, M., & Rogers, P. (2010). The Decision-Driven Organization. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2010/06/the-decision-driven-organization. 

21^st Century Enlightenment

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After viewing the above video, reflect on the following questions in a well-written post on your Reflection Blog. Do not simply list and answer the prompts. Instead, write your blog, incorporating your thoughts into your reflection. Make certain to incorporate your own experiences into your reflection.

• Why do you think the talk is titled 21st Century Enlightenment?
• What does Matthew Taylor mean when he says "to live differently, you have to think differently"?
• At one point in the video (4:10), Taylor argues that we need "to resist our tendencies to make right or true that which is merely familiar and wrong or false that which is only strange". What is he talking about? Can you think of an example within your company or your life that supports this point?
• Taylor argues that our society should eschew elements of pop culture that degrade people and that we should spend more time looking into what develops empathetic citizens. Would this be possible?
• At the end of the video, Taylor talks about atomizing people from collaborative environments and the destructive effect on their growth. What are the implications of these comments for organizational change efforts?
• What can you take away from this exercise to immediately use in your career?

Matthew Taylor’s (n.d.) discussion in the video 21^st Century Enlightenment was very intriguing and forces one to explore self and social awareness. This I believe is one of the reasons this discussion is labeled 21^st Century Enlightenment. In that, the time has arrived where we as human beings and as a society must re-examine who we are, where we’re are going, how we will get there, where there is and why it’s so important. In other words, just like the 18^th century enlightenment, we in the 21^st century must now look critically at all that we have become through the need to evolve as individuals and society and the technologically advances have both aided and morphed our current perceptions, beliefs, and values. This also leads me to believe this is central to Taylor’s (n.d.) statement of, “to live differently, you have to think differently." Indeed, much of our subconscious and conscious thoughts and beliefs directly shape who we are and how we respond to the countless messages we receive in our dynamic environments. This point is eloquently made by to Phil Mancuso (n.d.) as he discusses how such messages affected how is thought and its direct link to how he lived with a fear of public speaking.

All those messages, indelibly programmed into your subconscious combine to create your belief system. They become the filters through which we create our reality…our self-image, acting on them as if they’re true. While they don’t change the world around us, they filter our life experience until we believe them to be true. 

The tendency for mankind to accept change is historically poor. In fact, in many cases where change was immediately applied is when mankind has been on the brink. Nevertheless, there have been innovators and those, at the time considered not normal, have been ahead of their time and revolutionized some aspect of the world and reality that force change and or a different perception. Taylor (n.d.) states "to resist our tendencies to make right or true that which is merely familiar and wrong or false that which is only strange" sheds light on mankind’s resistance to change or attaching a negative connotation to anything different. In fact, there is a quote from Rear Admiral Grace Hopper that comes to mind as read Taylor’s statement. Hopper is quoted as saying, “The most dangerous phrase in the language is “we’ve always done it this way.”” I immediately recalled a situation while I was a new leader of a military organization and many of my senior leaders were preparing their formations for a field exercise and these leaders were following a pattern of preparation that didn’t seem to me as efficient. So I directly asked one of my leaders why things were occurring the way they were, she stated, “because that the way they always have been done here.” Needless to say, in this case, things did not remain the same. Resisting change is easy, accepting change is much more difficult.

There are many societal and cultural behaviors that develop from pop culture and enters societies mainstream. In fact, due to globalization and the technological advances it has brought to the masses, information, news, and Hollywood’s influence is widely available. By and large, society has taken to “up to the second” information (whether true or not is a different story) and its appetite for severe drama in the form of reality tv has grown over the years. I would even venture to say that many who indulge in this form of “fix” tend to perpetuate the need for more exciting new “flavors” that lead to the degrading and marginalizing of others. The source of this I believe is what Taylor was noting as society needing to eschew. I think that Taylor is correct in believing that society at large would have to arrive at a point (brink) to collectively hold such behavior and material as detrimental and thus push away from such pop culture. Yet, I do not believe Taylor full acknowledges at the same time that it is the same society that he believes should eschew, is in fact thirsting for more. I feel that one of the most significant reason much of this material is around or accepted is because it has made it way into people’s lives (society) through the form of entertainment that such antics is not only accepted by many, but also reciprocated. Later when Towards the end of the video, Taylor also mention atomizing people from collaborative environments and the destructive effect on their growth. I believe that everyone has certain rights to think, believe, and act how they wish as long as it does not jeopardize the well-being of another. Limiting or fragmenting any one or groups as a result of this factors has the potential evoke singular actions. Diversity is essential for perspective to evolve and change to occur. On the other hand, I believe it should be handled responsibly. 

I feel that Taylor makes many great points. I too believe that we as human being should continually explore self-awareness and improvement. Moreover, as a result of the evolution and technological advances that have occurred of the past decades, we are destine to make a conscious effort to redirect where we are and where we are going (enlightenment). However, as I noted above, I believe that such drastic changes usually occur when we are on the brink. What event will lead to this, it is difficult to predict. Yet, as a society, I feel that we have more to offer to each other than the increased brash and dramatic behavior that tends to fill out consciousness. That being self-aware and empathic to other is an important aspect that will lead to the best results for all. This is something I believe is essential in any environment, especially in any professional environment.

References

Mancuso, P. (n.d.) Who Do You Think You Are? Your Perception Creates Your Reality. International Chiropractic Pediatric Association. Retrieved from http://www.chiro.org/ChiroAssistant/Articles/Who_Do_You_Think_You_Are.shtml.

Taylor, M. (n.d.) 21^st Century Enlightenment. RSA Animate. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AC7ANGMy0yo.